A preferred use of correspondingly dimensioned bellows is the protection of the passage area between two vehicles coupled with one another in an articulated manner. If two rail-borne or road vehicles coupled with one another in an articulated manner are used for passenger traffic, a passage device, which permits persons to pass over from one vehicle to the other, is commonly provided between the vehicles. To make possible such passage from one vehicle to the other without exposure to adverse environmental effects, such a passage device is surrounded with a passage protection device, and this passage protection device is frequently a bellows, in which a plurality of folded webs of fabric following one another in the longitudinal direction of the vehicles form, due to being connected to one another along the longitudinal edges, a tube which is closed all around and is connected to the front wall of one of the two vehicles at one end, and to the rear wall of the other of the two vehicles at the other end.
Such bellows have been generally known and frequently used; they are proven passage protection devices, which guarantee reliable protection for persons passing over between the vehicles for a long time; but they hardly hinder the relative movements between the vehicles, which are necessary for the travel of the vehicle.
In such a bellows, the roof, the side walls and the floor are assembly units manufactured separately, which are fitted together at the mutually corresponding edges to form the tube with a rectangular cross section. Particular attention must be paid to the transition areas between the side walls and the roof as well as between the side walls and the floor from the viewpoint that they shall define the contour of the bellows, on the one hand, but, on the other hand, they should not lead to any undesired stiffening of the bellows, nor hinder the mobility of the vehicles in relation to one another. In addition to this viewpoint, there arises the problem of special risks, be it due to rotting or to the risk of damage by external effects. If the side walls and the floor are fitted together, the connection device is particularly at risk.